SoupDragon
Mum of 1, LTWTT #2
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- Nov 25, 2014
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This is what I have written in my journal, but felt like sharing it here now.
My due date was Tuesday October 7th 2014. On October 5th, the Sunday, I started losing huge volumes of my plug, which had liquefied. Did you know that could happen? I didnt! That continued through the day, and I woke the next morning to mild contractions and still more plug. It seemed to settle down as the day went on, but on the 7th, the plug-loss was back and was now pink. I tried to stay busy with cleaning and organising the babys room and clothes, and my hospital bag, while the contractions gradually grew stronger.
When my husband got home from work that evening I told him I thought I was in labour but that I didnt think anything would happen any time soon...that 'maybe' he wouldn't be going to work on the Thursday. However, I tried to eat dinner (pasta with a tomato and vegetable sauce) and just couldnt. I had a bath to try to ease the pains, and found I couldnt get out once Id finished. My husband eventually managed to heave me out, and I started properly timing my contractions.
The contractions were fairly painful, lasting between 1 and 2 minutes, and were irregular but coming between 1 and 5 minutes apart. Because of that, I was concerned that I was closer to giving birth than Id realised, so I paged the birth unit for a callback. We waited around an hour, then surmised that the callback wasnt coming, so I then phoned the birth unit. They discovered the pager was in someones pocket with the sound off. They told me to wait at home as long as I could. So I waited another couple of hours, and phoned again to say we were coming in.
It was now Wednesday October 8th. We got to the hospital in the very early hours of the morning, and I was examined and told that, at 3cm dilated, I wasnt yet in active labour, but that I could stay for two hours. If I reached 4cm in that time, I would be admitted, but if not, home wed go. I was disappointed Id thought I must be at least 5cm, and I told my husband that I wasnt sure I could do this if this wasnt even active labour.
I was also found to be extremely dehydrated, and was ordered to drink as much water as possible. I struggled to sip while lying down, but then my husband asked for a straw, and oh the relief I must have downed about three litres of water!
We had some toast and jam, and I asked for a birthing ball, which I bounced on to try and help things along. Something must have worked, because when I was examined 2 hours later, I was 4cm dilated! Out came the gas and air, and this is where things start fragmenting for me. Its good stuff, but wow, does it make you lose your marbles! I'm not sure I'd want it for a future labour.
It seemed that the contractions suddenly became so much more intense, and I believe at one point I almost fell off the bed. I managed to stand for a while to try and help the baby descend, and at some point there was a dose of gaviscon, which I promptly threw up all over my poor husband.
Juat before the shift change at 8am, I was examined again and told I was at 6cm. Again, I was disappointed four hours had passed and Id expected to be at around 8cm by now. But nobody seemed particularly concerned, so I kept puffing on the gas and air, riding out the by now seismic contractions. Some time during the morning I was offered pethidine. I declined it at first, but later when offered again I gave in and had the injection, so I could sleep between contractions.
Things get really wobbly for me after this I vaguely remember being checked again in the early afternoon and being told I was still at 6cm. I was then moved round to the labour ward as the midwife unit felt my case was now too complicated, and had another injection of pethidine. I also remember being told off by the midwife who was covering my proper midwives lunch break for constantly using the gas and air, for not breathing room air between contractions. I couldnt actually tell when one contraction ended and the next began the pain was constant and overwhelming, and I told the midwife in no uncertain terms what I thought of her lecturing! After that I was attached to a CTG monitor and my husband was shown how to read the trace, so he could tell me when to use the gas and when to stop. The CTG showed I was contracting strongly and that the baby was fine, but these strong contractions didnt seem to be doing much.
The midwife suggested breaking my waters to help things along, explaining that without the fluid in the way, my babys head would be able to press more on my cervix, hopefully helping it to dilate more quickly. What a bizarre sensation, what felt like gallons of hot water running out of me.
Some point later, as soon as someone mentioned still 6cm and epidural, I believe my words were an emphatic yes please I swore up and down I wasnt going to have an epidural, but I needed one by that point. I was exhausted. There was a series of people then, all trying to (very painfully) site a drip for fluids and syntocinon. They all failed, and finally an anaesthetist came over and just did it, I barely felt the epidural going in, but oh, the sweet relief of no more contractions! I came back to myself a bit then, but I was so exhausted that I still dont remember much.
Around 8pm, I was checked again, and wowee, hurray, party time, I was 9cm! Finally things were moving!
Shift change, and the new midwife checked me well my cervix had swelled, and I was back down to 6cm. I wanted to cry. She also said that the babys head was the wrong way round I had been labouring back to back, and babys head was in completely the wrong position, so was itself swelling a little, and was unable to pass through my pelvis. She gave us a little time to think about what we wanted to do, and then a doctor came in with a consent form, saying ok, so youve been told you need a c-section, yes?
Er no!
I went to pieces then. My perfect birth experience of a natural delivery with just gas and air and a birthing pool was long gone, but until that point, I was under the impression that this baby would be coming out without surgical intervention. I flatly refused, and the doctor stated simply, your baby is okay right now, but I have two other sections tonight, and if you dont have a section now, I cant guarantee that baby will still be okay when Im free again. He left us to discuss it for a short time, and we realised that we had no choice. I signed the consent form, and my husband was taken to get changed into scrubs while I was taken to theatre. As Id already had an epidural, it was just topped up, meaning that once he was changed, my husband didnt have to wait outside, and could be with me from the beginning.
They tested how numb I was by getting me to try to lift my legs and wiggle my toes, which I couldnt do. Then there was a cold spray which gradually moved up my body, and I had to say cold when I felt it. Once satisfied that I was numb, the surgeon and nurses moved behind the screen, and the anaesthetist chatted to me and my husband, trying to keep us distracted from what was going on. She was lovely, and calmed my nerves quite a bit. She did warn me they started a while ago so you might feel some tugging, which indeed I did. It felt very strange and fairly unpleasant people digging around in your ribs is never good!
Pretty quickly, though, at 11.08pm, I heard very indignant baby cries and someone said oh wow, youve had a whopper! and this screaming bundle with loads of dark hair was lifted past my field of vision. That felt very surreal like it was someone elses baby there, and I was just a spectator. My husband went to find out if we had a boy or a girl, and to make sure all was ok, while they cleaned the baby up and did weights and measurements. He came back shortly, and told me weve got a daughter!. When he asked what the weight was in real money, they couldnt tell him the scale was in kg, which doesnt mean much to us and the conversion chart only went up to 10lb. Only up to 10lb. He did the calculations later, and we discovered our little girl was 10lb 2oz!
I lay with our baby girl wrapped up on my chest, utterly stunned and staring at her in shock and amazement. My husband went to get changed back into his own clothes while the last bits of stitching up were getting done, and then he met us in recovery, where I stayed for a little while. I cant really remember what happened in there I may have tried to breastfeed, or that may have come later, Im not sure.
When we were back in our room, he phoned my parents and then his Dad, to tell them the good news, and we just kind of flopped for a while, both exhausted and overwhelmed. I know I tried to feed the baby, and she wouldnt latch. The midwives were concerned as she had low blood sugar, and said she would have to be cup-fed formula while we tried to get feeding established.
A little way into the night, we talked about names. We had a shortlist, and my husband suggested a first and middle name from it. I looked at her closely, trying to decide if it suited her and it did. It was the only choice of name, really.
So the birth didnt go as I had envisaged it would. I told myself I was going into that labour room with an open mind and would accept whatever was needed to get the baby born safely, but when it came to it I was devastated about not being able to have the birth Id imagined and assumed I would have.
I've put in my original journal entry that it took me a long time to stop feeling like a failure...that's kind of a lie, I still very much feel like I failed. I had a debrief at the hospital, but they couldn't tell me why I had so much intervention when things were actually going ok to start with, if a little on the slow side. The midwife I spoke to there reckoned that them breaking my waters turned DD back-to-back, and if I'd just been left alone I might have been able to progress a bit better, but with the size of her, there's really no saying what would have happened and if she still would have got stuck regardless of how she was positioned.
The medical team felt I must have had undiagnosed GD to have such a big baby. I'm pretty small, and my husband is average height and build. I did have sugar in my pee a couple of times in pregnancy, but the midwife just said it was because I hadn't given a fmu specimen
For #2, in a few years' time, I've been cleared for VBAC (breech/other complications excluding, of course), and will be staying at home until the last possible moment, so there are minimal opportunities to interfere. I'll be having the absolute minimum number of internal checks, and NO drugs. Not even gas and air. Also GD diet from the moment of beginning TTC.
Wow, if you've read that novel, well done and thank you
My due date was Tuesday October 7th 2014. On October 5th, the Sunday, I started losing huge volumes of my plug, which had liquefied. Did you know that could happen? I didnt! That continued through the day, and I woke the next morning to mild contractions and still more plug. It seemed to settle down as the day went on, but on the 7th, the plug-loss was back and was now pink. I tried to stay busy with cleaning and organising the babys room and clothes, and my hospital bag, while the contractions gradually grew stronger.
When my husband got home from work that evening I told him I thought I was in labour but that I didnt think anything would happen any time soon...that 'maybe' he wouldn't be going to work on the Thursday. However, I tried to eat dinner (pasta with a tomato and vegetable sauce) and just couldnt. I had a bath to try to ease the pains, and found I couldnt get out once Id finished. My husband eventually managed to heave me out, and I started properly timing my contractions.
The contractions were fairly painful, lasting between 1 and 2 minutes, and were irregular but coming between 1 and 5 minutes apart. Because of that, I was concerned that I was closer to giving birth than Id realised, so I paged the birth unit for a callback. We waited around an hour, then surmised that the callback wasnt coming, so I then phoned the birth unit. They discovered the pager was in someones pocket with the sound off. They told me to wait at home as long as I could. So I waited another couple of hours, and phoned again to say we were coming in.
It was now Wednesday October 8th. We got to the hospital in the very early hours of the morning, and I was examined and told that, at 3cm dilated, I wasnt yet in active labour, but that I could stay for two hours. If I reached 4cm in that time, I would be admitted, but if not, home wed go. I was disappointed Id thought I must be at least 5cm, and I told my husband that I wasnt sure I could do this if this wasnt even active labour.
I was also found to be extremely dehydrated, and was ordered to drink as much water as possible. I struggled to sip while lying down, but then my husband asked for a straw, and oh the relief I must have downed about three litres of water!
We had some toast and jam, and I asked for a birthing ball, which I bounced on to try and help things along. Something must have worked, because when I was examined 2 hours later, I was 4cm dilated! Out came the gas and air, and this is where things start fragmenting for me. Its good stuff, but wow, does it make you lose your marbles! I'm not sure I'd want it for a future labour.
It seemed that the contractions suddenly became so much more intense, and I believe at one point I almost fell off the bed. I managed to stand for a while to try and help the baby descend, and at some point there was a dose of gaviscon, which I promptly threw up all over my poor husband.
Juat before the shift change at 8am, I was examined again and told I was at 6cm. Again, I was disappointed four hours had passed and Id expected to be at around 8cm by now. But nobody seemed particularly concerned, so I kept puffing on the gas and air, riding out the by now seismic contractions. Some time during the morning I was offered pethidine. I declined it at first, but later when offered again I gave in and had the injection, so I could sleep between contractions.
Things get really wobbly for me after this I vaguely remember being checked again in the early afternoon and being told I was still at 6cm. I was then moved round to the labour ward as the midwife unit felt my case was now too complicated, and had another injection of pethidine. I also remember being told off by the midwife who was covering my proper midwives lunch break for constantly using the gas and air, for not breathing room air between contractions. I couldnt actually tell when one contraction ended and the next began the pain was constant and overwhelming, and I told the midwife in no uncertain terms what I thought of her lecturing! After that I was attached to a CTG monitor and my husband was shown how to read the trace, so he could tell me when to use the gas and when to stop. The CTG showed I was contracting strongly and that the baby was fine, but these strong contractions didnt seem to be doing much.
The midwife suggested breaking my waters to help things along, explaining that without the fluid in the way, my babys head would be able to press more on my cervix, hopefully helping it to dilate more quickly. What a bizarre sensation, what felt like gallons of hot water running out of me.
Some point later, as soon as someone mentioned still 6cm and epidural, I believe my words were an emphatic yes please I swore up and down I wasnt going to have an epidural, but I needed one by that point. I was exhausted. There was a series of people then, all trying to (very painfully) site a drip for fluids and syntocinon. They all failed, and finally an anaesthetist came over and just did it, I barely felt the epidural going in, but oh, the sweet relief of no more contractions! I came back to myself a bit then, but I was so exhausted that I still dont remember much.
Around 8pm, I was checked again, and wowee, hurray, party time, I was 9cm! Finally things were moving!
Shift change, and the new midwife checked me well my cervix had swelled, and I was back down to 6cm. I wanted to cry. She also said that the babys head was the wrong way round I had been labouring back to back, and babys head was in completely the wrong position, so was itself swelling a little, and was unable to pass through my pelvis. She gave us a little time to think about what we wanted to do, and then a doctor came in with a consent form, saying ok, so youve been told you need a c-section, yes?
Er no!
I went to pieces then. My perfect birth experience of a natural delivery with just gas and air and a birthing pool was long gone, but until that point, I was under the impression that this baby would be coming out without surgical intervention. I flatly refused, and the doctor stated simply, your baby is okay right now, but I have two other sections tonight, and if you dont have a section now, I cant guarantee that baby will still be okay when Im free again. He left us to discuss it for a short time, and we realised that we had no choice. I signed the consent form, and my husband was taken to get changed into scrubs while I was taken to theatre. As Id already had an epidural, it was just topped up, meaning that once he was changed, my husband didnt have to wait outside, and could be with me from the beginning.
They tested how numb I was by getting me to try to lift my legs and wiggle my toes, which I couldnt do. Then there was a cold spray which gradually moved up my body, and I had to say cold when I felt it. Once satisfied that I was numb, the surgeon and nurses moved behind the screen, and the anaesthetist chatted to me and my husband, trying to keep us distracted from what was going on. She was lovely, and calmed my nerves quite a bit. She did warn me they started a while ago so you might feel some tugging, which indeed I did. It felt very strange and fairly unpleasant people digging around in your ribs is never good!
Pretty quickly, though, at 11.08pm, I heard very indignant baby cries and someone said oh wow, youve had a whopper! and this screaming bundle with loads of dark hair was lifted past my field of vision. That felt very surreal like it was someone elses baby there, and I was just a spectator. My husband went to find out if we had a boy or a girl, and to make sure all was ok, while they cleaned the baby up and did weights and measurements. He came back shortly, and told me weve got a daughter!. When he asked what the weight was in real money, they couldnt tell him the scale was in kg, which doesnt mean much to us and the conversion chart only went up to 10lb. Only up to 10lb. He did the calculations later, and we discovered our little girl was 10lb 2oz!
I lay with our baby girl wrapped up on my chest, utterly stunned and staring at her in shock and amazement. My husband went to get changed back into his own clothes while the last bits of stitching up were getting done, and then he met us in recovery, where I stayed for a little while. I cant really remember what happened in there I may have tried to breastfeed, or that may have come later, Im not sure.
When we were back in our room, he phoned my parents and then his Dad, to tell them the good news, and we just kind of flopped for a while, both exhausted and overwhelmed. I know I tried to feed the baby, and she wouldnt latch. The midwives were concerned as she had low blood sugar, and said she would have to be cup-fed formula while we tried to get feeding established.
A little way into the night, we talked about names. We had a shortlist, and my husband suggested a first and middle name from it. I looked at her closely, trying to decide if it suited her and it did. It was the only choice of name, really.
So the birth didnt go as I had envisaged it would. I told myself I was going into that labour room with an open mind and would accept whatever was needed to get the baby born safely, but when it came to it I was devastated about not being able to have the birth Id imagined and assumed I would have.
I've put in my original journal entry that it took me a long time to stop feeling like a failure...that's kind of a lie, I still very much feel like I failed. I had a debrief at the hospital, but they couldn't tell me why I had so much intervention when things were actually going ok to start with, if a little on the slow side. The midwife I spoke to there reckoned that them breaking my waters turned DD back-to-back, and if I'd just been left alone I might have been able to progress a bit better, but with the size of her, there's really no saying what would have happened and if she still would have got stuck regardless of how she was positioned.
The medical team felt I must have had undiagnosed GD to have such a big baby. I'm pretty small, and my husband is average height and build. I did have sugar in my pee a couple of times in pregnancy, but the midwife just said it was because I hadn't given a fmu specimen
For #2, in a few years' time, I've been cleared for VBAC (breech/other complications excluding, of course), and will be staying at home until the last possible moment, so there are minimal opportunities to interfere. I'll be having the absolute minimum number of internal checks, and NO drugs. Not even gas and air. Also GD diet from the moment of beginning TTC.
Wow, if you've read that novel, well done and thank you
